How to Wake up from the American Dream
by yllimilly
Summary: It's a matter of opening up to the world around you. TKB x Mai, for contest.


AN

(this story was written for a contest)

I planned a plunny that was too long and complex for the time I allocated for writing this entry, and this incomplete blurb, the exposition to a 10k+ story, really, is what I was able to come up with. If there's one thing I learned in Season 11, is that clearing up a ten hour writing window in a schedule otherwise packed with mental and intellectual intensive activities just doesn't work for me - I need to give my brain time to breathe in order to create good fiction. I still value your comments, though. Best, Milly ~

* * *

She'd made herself swear not to barge in on her lovers anymore, especially not if they lived in a 'squat house'. But she had too much time on her hands and she was bored and well, also a little curious…

She wanted to see him.

She wanted to see him because he was refreshingly different. For starters, he'd never judged her. Neither her actions nor her motives, and it had been obvious from the start that he was okay with her being in charge, but not in a pseudo-gallant way. He was just a genuinely laid back kind of person. (Not to mention that his guitarist hands were skilled enough to make her come simply by doing _something_ to her nipples).

In earlier times, Mai normally wouldn't have given much thought to a musician met in a house party of an friend of a friend. Perhaps the mid-twenties were doing something to her. Perhaps she was changing, she mused. The hint of a smile etched itself on her perfectly defined vermillion lips.

Mai Kujaku, 24, had it all: she was a beautiful woman with a beautiful body, embellished by beautiful clothes and accessories, and had an enviable career as the assistant manager of the Domino City Casino (the glam of the game, complete with pension and benefits) that she had obtained thanks to her intelligence and hard work. Her less than ideal love life was the only downside, but she was in no rush to settle down just yet. She was financially independent, having fully paid the loans to her downtown condo and car - car which she was not driving, given how it would either get defaced or stolen in this residential, post industrial corner of the city's outskirts.

Undeterred by the impending darkness and scarcity of functioning streetlights, Mai carried on strutting through the fissured sidewalks. Her heels stomped and crunched gravel and kicked cement chunks out of her way, while her perfectly manicured fingers brushing against the bump in her purse she knew to be her precious pepper spray bottle…

She hugged herself as she turned the corner of a seemingly deserted street. This was a chilly evening for early August; a reminder that summer, like all good things, was coming to an end.

**HOW TO WAKE UP FROM THE AMERICAN DREAM**

Mai confirmed the address, and contemplated the boarded windows of the house with unease. The front yard crumbled under the weeds. Mai felt another chill run down her spine - and this time it wasn't due to a cold breeze.

"Hi!"

"Um, hi…" Mai tried to locate the voice. "I'm visiting someone…" She saw a girl waving at her from the only remaining glass window.

"Sure, come right in! Use the back door," the youthful female voice instructed.

Mai walked alongside the house and into nothing less than a little forest. In the darkness, her footing was less than certain; sometimes she nearly tripped on thick weeds, sometimes her heels sank too deep into the soft earth, and sometimes an unpleasant wet, sucking sound made itself heard when she wanted to rescue her poor boots. She leaned against the rough, dark brick of the house as both a reference and for balance. She turned a corner; the backyard was completely engulfed in obscurity, with the neighbouring houses invisible through layers and layers of thick foliage. Mai suddenly wished she's thought of better plans for her only evening off work than to come visit a haunted house.

A young male burst out of the back doors, and along with him, the indoor light. He wore a red tunic and an unruly heap of blondish hair - hard to tell in the dim backlight. She could hear the repeated flickers of a stubborn lighter.

"Um, hey."

The man turned to her. "Hey," he echoed, not even turning to see Mai, hunched over his tobacco.

"Patrick lives here, right?"

The man turned to Mai, freed his lips from the precious white stick. "Yes and no… You can come and see for yourself." He showed her the door, which hung wide open, vomiting yellow light. He looked at her intensely, studying her, and she stared back at his chiaroscuro profile.

The man broke the gaze first and resumed giving more attention to his smoke - in vain.

"But do you know if he's here or not tonight?" No point in risking entering that house for no reason.

"Like I said, you can come and see for yourself if you'd like. What, are you afraid? We're not going to mug you. We don't care about your Louis Vuitton bag," his suave voice claimed with marked disdain.

Mai scoffed. The man chuckled, which irritated Mai even more. She dug out a pink plastic lighter from her, yes Vuitton bag, and marched up to him. From up close, she could see his exposed chest, the taut tan skin on his well defined muscles.

"You're not gonna go far with your grandpa's relic," she said hinting at the clearly empty legacy metallic lighter. He didn't move.

She brought her hands close to his face and switched it on. Under his eye, a scar so perfectly defined it might as well have been intentional. A bit shocked, perhaps, Mai dropped her lighter to the floor. "Shit."

"If that's plastic I'm not using it."

"Don't be a smartass and help me find it," she said from below.

"I think I kind of like the view from here." He chuckled again.

Mai had heard this enough times to know it was a deal breaker. On a whim, she stood up and attempted to slap him - but the man caught hold of her wrist. Firmly, but not to hurt. Only strong enough to control. Adrenaline rushed to her brain as is from a firehose.

"Let go of me," she commanded.

"Relax, sweetie, I'm not going to do anything you don't consent to."

"I'm not consenting to _this_."

She humored him for a few more seconds, then brusquely spun her arm outwards, forcibly removing herself from his grip.

"If you're not going to help, step back."

"No one tells me what to do."

"Even in bed?"

"Except in bed."

Mai considered him for a moment. Why had she even brought this up?

"That's not going to get you to sleep with me." She crouched again and blindly patted the ground.

"I'm out of your league."

Mai stood up with her prized flame in a bottle and wiped the wet earth off of it. "That's usually my line," she remarked, half-amused at the thought that a low life like this be anything but below anyone's standards.

"Oh, I bet it is." He chuckled again. A low, dry, somehow ominous chuckle.

Mai ignored him and fished around in her purse for her own pack of cigarettes. She'd gotten all worked up by this jerk - might as well relax before meeting her bohemian flame. If he even was home. She flicked the lighter again and the flame shone high and bright between them. She lit her cigarette and inhaled deeply, savoring the initial rush of chemicals to her brain.

"Are you just going to stare at me or what?"

Silently, he leaned forward and cupped his hands, joining the two ends of their smokes together. His fingers were calloused, adorned with a myriad of scars. The air between them quickly filled up with the fragrant scent of weed.

Her eyes were getting used to the darkness. She could begin to make out the shapes of a little run down shed in the corner of the yard, of what must be gardening tools piled up against it. The man next to her was a slow smoker. She wasn't - in no time she was quelling the little stick under the sole of her boots. She fished in her purse for another one -

"You need to relax." He was looking at her with dilated pupils. Between his fingers, his half consumed joint as a peace offering.

She took it. Why the heck not?

It was good stuff. She held it back to the man. He refused it.

"You barely had any."

"I can't. I haven't had weed in forever."

"Why?"

She shrugged. "Interferes with my job."

"You better quit your job, then." He made it sound almost as if it was some sort of inside joke.

"No offense, dumpstering for food and going to protests isn't how I want to spend my waking hours, thank you."

The man considered this for a moment. "Well, I do take offense."

"Whatever."

"You're not very grateful by nature, aren't you?"

"What is it exactly you do for a living?" Mai asked, irritated.

"I fight oppression and kyriarchy. I am building a new world order."

Whatever that meant. "... Right."

Ooh, that joint really hit the spot. Magic fingers could wait a few more minutes. She wondered how it would affect her 'performance', though.

"I bet you have a whole of orgies, here. Communist orgies."

"... You could come and see for yourself if you like."

Her body remembered at that moment the feeling of his fist around her wrist, and the thought aroused her. _It's the weed_, she concluded. "Fine." She allowed herself to smile more than she'd like. "Convince me, then."

He turned to her and pinned her down with a wanton, predatory gaze.

She'd rarely felt so… _intruded _upon.

Slowly, he stepped closer, and closer, until his hand was hovering above her arm, and shoulder. He leaned in closer and took in her scent as she took in his - musky, the earthy blend of sweat and dust so typical of yard work. She lifted her hand and he caught hold of wrist as if by reflex - it felt electric. He looked straight into her eyes. She failed to suppress a moan at the sight of such raw, naked need. He cupped her chin with his free hand and she shivered.

"Not- not here," she complained when the intensity of his gaze grew unbearable.

"Where else?" He whispered against her lips.

She could only wait. Wait and let the universe _be_.

"... You're intoxicated," he said abruptly, killing the mood instantly. The joint was wrenched from her fingers and her wrist was free again. The man had stepped back to a distance much more reasonable for the safety of her ovaries.

"So are you," she replied, flustered, setting the lapels of her short sleeve jacket in place though they hadn't been touched upon.

"Keen observer of the human soul, are you."

She frowned. "And I can tell you're nothing but trouble."

He smirked.


End file.
